Diary of Madness
I blinked several times at the shadows moving slowly across the wall. At first I thought my vision was still blurry from the accident. Then I thought the shadows were created from the flickering of flames from an unseen fire. Finally, I realized the ghostly shapes were the shadows cast by people moving back and forth in front of an unseen source of light. I turned my head to see a dim hallway filled with people wearing bathrobes and hospital smocks. Bare light bulbs hung from the ceiling. Droplets of water slid down the tiled walls. Was this a hospital?
I didn’t move. I kept my face turned to the hallway. The patients, if this was indeed a hospital, were mute. Not one of them looked at me laying on the gurney. Some wore worn slippers. Others scraped along with dirty bare feet. I detected the faint smell of urine and mold. I drifted back into sleep.
I awoke some time later to the low hum of moans. Not the moans of pain so much as those of despair. The light bulbs seemed to glow with less intensity. My eyelids closed once again.
The next time I awoke it was to the echo of loud bangs like firecrackers. I turned to see two men pointing guns above the heads of those shuffling down the hallway. Both wore ripped pants, yellow undershirts-also ripped-and spiked collars. Both had bright green hair. They fired their guns into the air again.
“Better believe it,” the taller one shouted.
This caused panic in some of the people in the hallway. They began to scream. Some knocked others over scrambling for safety I know not where. I could only see an endless hallway filled with people dimly lit with a few light bulbs dangling from the ceiling. Others took no notice of the gunmen or the fact these gunman had discharged their weapons. These people continued to shuffle along in their slippers or bare feet. This was not the response the gunmen wanted.
They shot into the crowd. At this, the crowd erupted universally into the chaos, I presume, the gunmen had in mind. The noise of all those voices screaming in terror, all those feet in worn slippers scraping along the bare concrete, and the laughing of the gunmen carried above the rest of the cacophony, is something I will never forget and never want to experience again. If it were possible to climb inside a running jet engine and survive, the hallway where I laid on the gurney would be the equivalent.
It was at this point I decided I couldn’t remain on the gurney. The gunman looked hungry for more chaos and destruction.
Four dead bodies were all that remained.
I could hear the last of the others escaping down the hallway. I remained still.
The eyes of the gunmen played over me before they turned their attention to the prey fleeing. I listened to the thunder of their footsteps as they pursued their prey like beasts on the hunt.
The hospital was subterranean. Bare light bulbs lit the hallways. Condensation ran down the walls. I was left on a gurney in an alcove off the main hallway. The hallway was filled with people. Strange characters. I drifted in and out until a succession of loud pops echoed through the hospital. I looked over and two men dressed like characters from Mad Max were shooting above the heads of the people in the hallway. “You better believe it,” one of them screamed.
Some people panicked; the ones who looked more normal than the rest. The others seemed not to notice. The two gunmen shot into the ground, wounding one or two people. They then rushed down the hallway. At this point I decided I couldn’t stay in the hospital. I felt recovered enough to move. I found a staircase at the end of the hallway and followed it up to the next level.
I emerged into the middle of a department store. At least the room resembled a department store. People seemed to be looking at merchandise on the shelves. Nobody talked. I could see several women, all blonde, pale, large dark eyes, in uniforms. They looked to be sales staff. I attempted to ask one of them where I was and what place I was in. She turned to me and shrieked, as if in mortal terror. This brought the other sales ladies running. All of them stood around me shrieking. They closed the circle around me and began grabbing at me. Their dark eyes turned a pale blue and they bared their teeth. I knew I was in trouble. I was able to break free of the group. They pursued me through the store. Several times I came close to getting cornered.
Meanwhile, the other people who appeared to be shopping when I first entered continued shopping. They took no notice of the chase taking place around them. They did not notice shelves being knocked over or the terrifying screams coming from the women in uniforms.
I eventually managed to escape into an elevator. The elevator had only two buttons: the floor before and the floor after. I assumed the floor before was the hospital I had started in. But what was the floor after? It obviously was after the nightmare of the department store but maybe it was something else, something worse. I had begun to think anything was possible in this place. I had no choice but select the floor after. I could hear the howling of the women on the other side of the elevator door.
This is where the dream ends.